But Paul thought not good to take him with them who departed from them from Pamphylia, and went not with them to the work. Acts 15:38
Do you know the term ‘tough love’? And have you ever used the concept, or have you ever been the recipient of a tough love action? The dictionary defines tough love as a promotion of a person’s welfare, especially that of an addict, child, or criminal, by enforcing certain constraints on them, or requiring them to take responsibility for their actions. Some extreme but often effective ways in which parents have exercised tough love with lazy or unmotivated children are to evict them from the parents’ home and force them to make a living for themselves. By forcing people to take responsibility for their actions, or inactions, tough love enables its objects to rise above their failures and vices to become worthwhile members of a family and of society. Was Paul in our text displaying tough love toward John Mark, or was he just being careful and practical?
Paul and Barnabas both remembered how Mark had bailed out on them during the perilous days in Pamphylia. But Barnabas, Mark’s uncle, now appeared to be satisfied that Mark had learned his lesson and would make a good team member during the second missionary journey. Paul thought otherwise. He refused to allow Mark to go with them. Perhaps he felt he could not trust Mark, and he certainly had good reason. But perhaps he also felt that Mark needed to be taught a valuable lesson. If so, his tough love worked, as we look back on all that happened. Many years later, Paul would commend Mark as being useful to him, and he was certainly useful to the Lord Who used him to write the second of the Gospels. According to tradition, Mark was killed as he tried to spread the Gospel in the Greek city of Alexandria. Despite his stumble in Pamphylia, Mark certainly had a valuable and victorious life as a Christian. And he no doubt owed much of his worthwhile contribution to the Lord’s work to the reluctance of Paul to take him along.
One of the valuable lessons that young men and women need to learn in their service for the Lord is commitment. The Lord has little use for wishy-washy hot-and-cold Christians. Paul at his conversion made a lifetime commitment to His Lord, and through the years that followed, he was faithful to that commitment. He must have been dreadfully disappointed when Mark left Pamphylia to go home. It would have been his desire that Mark would continue to grow in his spiritual abilities, but that desire had been dashed. Now that the second mission trip was about to begin, Paul objects to Mark’s participation. He objected because he wanted Mark to grow up some more, and because he really cared about the young man.
Sometimes young Christians need to be reminded of the value of the Lord’s work and of their need to be fully committed to it. -Jim MacIntosh